“Renton says it’s a miracle that he made it out of adolescence alive.”

June 30, 2023 5:17 PM

He’s The Trans Son Of An Anti-Trans Influencer. It’s His Turn To Speak. A long article by Christopher Mathias about Renton Sinclair. [CW: attempted suicide, conversion therapy]
posted by Kattullus (30 comments total)

When Renton Sinclair texted his mom to say that he was transgender, she summoned a curse on the testosterone he was taking.

“I actually went after the medicine, and I cursed it in the name of Jesus, and I said, ‘No, you’re not going to work. I don’t know if you’re going to make her sick or whatever, but she’s going to have to go off that medicine,’” Tania Joy Gibson recounted recently during an episode of her podcast, repeatedly misgendering her child.

literally what is wrong with people??
posted by taquito sunrise at 5:24 PM on June 30, 2023 [40 favorites]

I literally the fuck do not know how these “Christian” apostles of Satan read their damn holy book and do not see their god looking out at them sadly, shaking their head and saying goodbye. It it is so blindingly obvious.

“Suffer the children” does not mean “make your children suffer” you god damned* morons.

*speaking absolutely literally here.
posted by GenjiandProust at 6:10 PM on June 30, 2023 [34 favorites]

Some people hate their children to begin with and fundamentalist religion gives them a cover. Some people love their children but fundamentalist religion pushes them to do hateful things to their children. This mother sounds like she might be in the first category.
posted by clawsoon at 6:11 PM on June 30, 2023 [17 favorites]

Sorry, that was a lot, but I thought I might have an aneurism.

Moloch, Moloch, Moloch, indeed.
posted by GenjiandProust at 6:15 PM on June 30, 2023 [4 favorites]

I've got a friend doing anti-conversion therapy work, and it is really, really hard on him and his team to listen to stories like these over and over. They're rightfully proud of their work, I'm furious it's necessary, but grateful they're doing it. And I'm glad Renton has survived and is sharing his story. I have no words for his mother.
posted by EvaDestruction at 6:29 PM on June 30, 2023 [20 favorites]

Yeah, I had to stop reading.

WTF is wrong with these people? Christianity plays a big part, obviously, but I do know several Christians who aren't assholes like this woman. Just so ugh.
posted by Windopaene at 6:31 PM on June 30, 2023 [2 favorites]

“Like even as an adult, the idea of having [hormone therapy] taken away, it’s literally life-altering, and it’s a life-saving medication, and it’s life-saving care,” Renton says. “And it’s just — I don’t know, it’s like having a fucking cure for cancer and like knowing you can fix things and just not caring. It’s just a level of inhumane that — like, I don’t even know how you fix that.”

Reminds me that there were objections to a literal cancer vaccine from the usual suspects.
posted by ChurchHatesTucker at 6:44 PM on June 30, 2023 [17 favorites]

Mod note: Comment and response removed. Please avoid commenting about the appearance of trans folks, they often get unsolicited negative feedback from strangers about what they do with their bodies and we don't need to reproduce that here.
posted by Brandon Blatcher (staff) at 7:18 PM on June 30, 2023 [57 favorites]

"She believes it’s her divine destiny and duty to take part in the current conservative crusade to force trans people out of public life, a necessary step in paving the path for Christ’s return."

This would be funny if it weren't so cruel. I wonder what Christ's opinion of trans people would be. I guess he would just love them.
posted by Joan Rivers of Babylon at 7:23 PM on June 30, 2023 [15 favorites]

As the mother of a genderqueer adult who is just beginning a transition, I am not yet ready to click on the link. It is unimaginable for me to be anything but supportive of my child. Nobody should have to deal with such heartless behavior from their parent.
posted by Scout405 at 8:04 PM on June 30, 2023 [33 favorites]

“I actually went after the medicine, and I cursed it in the name of Jesus, and I said, ‘No, you’re not going to work. I don’t know if you’re going to make her sick or whatever, but she’s going to have to go off that medicine'.”

Yeah, it didn't involve Jesus, but I'm pretty sure my relatives also tried this. You'll be shocked to hear that I am still on the medicine, which worked, and also did not make me sick.

For all that I have been told that perceiving my internal gender means that I am "inventing a false reality" and that if I "actually made an effort," I could simply "create a new reality of not being trans," what do you know? It seems there is still no proof for a cheat code of prayer or magical thoughts or energy work where you can simply order reality to stop being real. I mean, damn, if that worked, I would've canceled my dysphoria back in like...middle school.

For personal reasons, I could not keep reading after that opener, so I just hope Renton is doing as okay as he can be. I can't imagine adding the public eye to this kind of trauma.
posted by desert outpost at 8:11 PM on June 30, 2023 [25 favorites]

He deserved a better mother :(

He deserved a better stepfather :(

All trans kids deserve love and support and acceptance and access to gender-affirming-care.
posted by chariot pulled by cassowaries at 8:48 PM on June 30, 2023 [17 favorites]

This would be funny if it weren't so cruel. I wonder what Christ's opinion of trans people would be. I guess he would just love them.

We can't be worse than tax collectors, and he had time for them, so...
posted by Dysk at 8:52 PM on June 30, 2023 [14 favorites]

For personal reasons, I could not keep reading after that opener, so I just hope Renton is doing as okay as he can be. I can't imagine adding the public eye to this kind of trauma.

The article suggests that he is pretty ok, and that he has friends and and family who support and love him.
posted by plonkee at 12:24 AM on July 1, 2023 [17 favorites]

These days Renton co-owns a pub in Kansas City. He also works as the sous-chef there, spending upwards of 65 hours a week in a hot kitchen with chef and co-owner Graham Fox Farris, who is also Renton’s best friend...

They hire trans folks here, and if the state of Missouri were to pass one of those laws restricting who uses what bathroom, Renton and Graham wouldn’t give two shits about enforcing it.

“All our regulars have your back, too,” Graham assured Renton, who agreed.

One of those regulars is Graham’s mom, Natalie Fox, a nice Christian woman from Olathe. Renton once told Natalie about Tania, about how she’d been Miss Illinois but now is an anti-trans influencer. Natalie got all worked up about it, assuring Renton that he is deserving of love. “You’re going through a beautiful transformation!” she told Renton.

Something about the phrase “beautiful transformation” really makes Graham and Renton laugh, and they’ll sometimes drop the phrase into a conversation as a little inside joke. “My mom loves Renton,” Graham said.

“I love her,” Renton replied. (Natalie told HuffPost that she is “so thankful that Renton is in our family’s life.”)

posted by clawsoon at 5:00 AM on July 1, 2023 [30 favorites]

This article briefly touches on the genocidal nature of the gender-critical movement, something the Lemkin Institute for Genocide Prevention agrees with. (I'm also very grateful to the Lemkin Institute for calling out the UK as much as the US on these grounds.)

Sharing this here because, as a trans person, it's the one piece of writing I most wish cis allies would read and share.
posted by terretu at 5:31 AM on July 1, 2023 [27 favorites]

Thank you for sharing this. I realized during the pandemic that I'm nonbinary (but lean toward masc presenting). I've been very slowly talking about this with people when it feels safe to do so, but I don't think I'll ever tell my parents. They share the exact set of ideals with Renton's mom, just a seething pit of paranoia.

I'm really glad Renton is okay, and I hate hate hate that so many trans kids who don't have the support and love to find ways to exist that make them happy have to deal with this fucked up country.

I've sent this article to a close friend and hope to keep pushing the margins here in my small sphere.
posted by TheKaijuCommuter at 7:35 AM on July 1, 2023 [9 favorites]

Thanks, terretu. Sharing everywhere.
posted by cooker girl at 7:38 AM on July 1, 2023 [1 favorite]

While his mom is engaging in spiritual warfare in the End Times, Renton is rolling a joint as the sun sets on his porch in Kansas City, his dog, a pit-lab mix named Tiberius, at his feet, and his partner Greg at his side.

Pick your side, I guess.

Props to Renton's supportive Dad, too, and to Graham, who seems like a real friend. (Their hand-holding pranking & the club fight scene are deliciously wonderful)
posted by chavenet at 8:00 AM on July 1, 2023 [8 favorites]

i wish i had both the attention span and the social engineering skills to:

1. somehow convince renton’s mom that i have an evangelical fundamentalist podcast
2. trick her into coming onto that podcast
3. start the interview off with pointed, hostile questions about her divorces and just absolutely positively refuse to drop the topic, blame everything in her life on her unchristian treatment of the holy bonds of matrimony, talk about adulterers burning in hell, blame literally everything in her life on her demonic satan-inspired hellish divorce addiction, etc. etc. etc.

it is good that i have neither the attention span nor the social engineering skills to accomplish any of that, and really there’s something a little toxic about that fantasy (oh god what if the christians really did kick off another anti-divorce frenzy?) but sometimes i indulge in imagining a comeuppance, and this is the imaginary comeuppance i am currently indulging in.
posted by bombastic lowercase pronouncements at 9:13 AM on July 1, 2023 [7 favorites]

I am now incredibly thankful that my mom went from "what's trans" to "I always kinda suspected you were gay or something but this is new" to "completely supportive of her daughter" in the space of a couple of weeks.

It is also very nice to see a major media outlet like the HuffPost openly talking about how trans people are the current hot-button issue the right-wingers are using to get people angry, and get those donations coming in. They really don't give a shit about us, they just care about getting their audience pissed off enough to give them money.

Anyway, hooray for this dude's dad not being a total right-wing lunatic, and giving him space to figure his shit out and make some friends instead of shoving him back into the same tiny box Mom probably got shoved into by her family and the pageant circles.
posted by egypturnash at 9:25 AM on July 1, 2023 [23 favorites]

I wonder what Christ's opinion of trans people would be.

Well, the Bible doesn't really have anything much to say about them, which is how you can tell that the people who moved on from persecuting gays to persecuting trans people were never really about the Bible to begin with.

Religion doesn't have to make you like this. My (very pious) mom doesn't have the up-to-date vocabulary or ideology, but when it comes up in the news, she always says, "Why should I care? They're not hurting anybody."
posted by praemunire at 9:49 AM on July 1, 2023 [17 favorites]

Because several people have asked, there is a whole world of Christianity that bears no resemblance to the one that gets all the news coverage in the US and that openly affirms trans folks, including them throughout the life of the church, and explains the theology behind that much more coherently than Tania here could ever explain her theology because hers doesn't seem to make much sense. A few US examples: Metropolitan Community Church, United Church of Christ, The Episcopal Church, More Light Presbyterians (and the recently PCUSA denominationally approved affirmation of trans people)
posted by hydropsyche at 11:55 AM on July 1, 2023 [6 favorites]

If Renton gets more famous than his mom, I'd watch out for her to come sniffing around for a "redemption" story
posted by anazgnos at 12:01 PM on July 1, 2023 [1 favorite]

Some parts were hard to read but overall it's a story of strength and resilience and hope.

I wish/hope my family would read it and understand that it's not about choosing some kind of random persona. It's life or death.
posted by emjaybee at 12:03 PM on July 1, 2023 [4 favorites]

Can we stop with the derail about divorce being a sin please?

Kthanx.

I don't degrudge anyone's revenge fantasy but if it were a feasible reality it wouldn't change anyone's mind in a positive way so let's not indulge in the idea.
posted by Faintdreams at 1:48 PM on July 1, 2023 [2 favorites]

The article sounds too harrowing for me personally to read - the snippets discussed here are horrifying/heartbreaking enough - but I am glad that Renton Sinclair found friends and family who accept him for who he is and seems to have build a successful and stable life for himself.

Letting people know that these things are attainable if you are Trans and that yes Trans people deserve/can obtain a happy life is a message that (sadly) needs reinforcing particularly strongly at this point in time.
posted by Faintdreams at 1:54 PM on July 1, 2023 [5 favorites]

My mom is an 87-year-old Jewish lady.

The first-ever time any trans-related news discussion popped up, her only comment was she "felt terrible" for them...because "imagine how awful it must be to feel like you don't belong in the body everyone else pushes you to have and use the way they think it should be." Her initial reaction was simple empathy — she thought, "how much must it suck to not feel like you fit and the rest of the world seems intent on forcing you to be something you're not?" Compassion without judgment.

May Renton, and all the Rentons out there, find and keep the peace and joy they deserve. (And though I don't believe in hell, I'm good with inventing one for people like Renton's mother, whose beauty pageant hairspray can spark and burn her with eternal flames.)
posted by The Wrong Kind of Cheese at 6:27 PM on July 1, 2023 [10 favorites]

Mod note: One (and a response) removed. Mysterious weirdly detailed reference with transphobic overtones to an unidentified mystery person (who apparently has nothing to do with the post? ) is confusing, offputting and deraily.
posted by taz (staff) at 10:17 PM on July 1, 2023 [8 favorites]

These days Renton co-owns a pub in Kansas City. He also works as the sous-chef there, spending upwards of 65 hours a week in a hot kitchen with chef and co-owner Graham Fox Farris, who is also Renton’s best friend...

I know where we're going for dinner next time we go out.
posted by jferg at 8:21 AM on July 2, 2023 [7 favorites]